Katz: It’s An Honor to Be Called a ‘Liar’ by Liberman

In an interview Thursday, Foreign Minister Yisrael Katz said that Avigdor Liberman’s portrayal of him as a “liar” in an interview Erev Yom Kippur was actually “the greatest compliment I got all year. This from a man whose entire political career is based on lies. When I said after the April election that Liberman was part of a plot to put Benny Gantz in the prime minister’s office, despite his commitment to voters to suppot Binyamin Netanyahu, he said I was lying and threatened me with a lawsuit.”

“Now,” after the publication of his plan to resolve the coalition crisis, “it’s clear why months have passed and no lawsuit has been filed,” Katz said. “He is moving to the next stage, and has become a direct agent or at least a major linchpin in a government that will be based on the support of Ayman Odeh and the United Arab List.”

In a “confessional” interview on Erev Yom Kippur, Liberman called Likud MK Miri Regev “an animal,” Katz “a despicable liar,” and Aryeh Deri “a traitor for what he did to me.” He would not be surprised if “Netanyahu and his people are running a private investigation against me and my family. Netanyahu’s problem is that the second you have an opinion other than his and he perceives you as a threat to his interests, he turns into your personal enemy. Right away he claims that you hate him, that you are a leftist, that you are trying to unseat him. He just ignores the facts.”

When Ben Caspit, his interviewer, recommended that he perhaps apologize or at least temper his remarks – since the interview was to be published before Yom Kippur – Liberman said that he “apologizes from the bottom of my heart to the animals. The Likud of today has no connection to the Revisionist movement” of Ze’ev Jabotinsky, on which it was originally based. “Today it is just a collection of pathetic dealmakers, like the pathetic liar Yisrael Katz. For them the Likud is a platform for personal advancement.”

Speaking Thursday, Katz said that Liberman’s remarks speak for themselves – and that with his new plan, which calls for the Likud to give up its support of its rightwing coalition partners, Liberman was essentially voting for a government supported by the United Arab List. “Failure to vote against an attempt by Gantz to form such a government will lead to the establishment of an anti-Zionist government. The only real solution is a unity government between the Likud and Blue and White, under the plan proposed by President Reuven Rivlin. As the candidate with the most support, Netanyahu will serve first as prime minister. The sooner Blue and White understands this, the faster a government can be established.”